Neena Gupta's career revival after the release of 2018 film Badhaai Ho has been something of a phenomenon in the notoriously unforgiving world of Hindi cinema. The actress, in her recently-released memoir Sach Kahun Toh recalled the time when she asked for work in an Instagram post. In a chapter dedicated to what led up to the post and its aftermath, the veteran actress confessed that she was "choked with guilt and shame" after sharing the post. The reason was her daughter Masaba Gupta, who is a successful designer and made her acting debut with Netflix's Masaba Masaba. "The media I could handle; my friends asking me if I was okay, if my life and marriage was okay, I could handle. What was scaring me was my daughter, a widely recognised and famous fashion designer and public figure, Masaba Gupta would say."
Much to Neena Gupta's surprise, her daughter gave the actress a huge shout out on social media. "As I waited for a call or an angry text, expecting yet another lesson in social media, I received a long and beautiful message from my daughter who had shared my post with her followers," she added.
This is the post Masaba Gupta had shared back then:
The Sardar Ka Grandson actress also revealed what made her share the post in the first place. Back in 2017, after her meeting Zoya Akhtar for a part in the web-series Made In Heaven (Neena Gupta starred in an episode), she was leaving her office when the filmmaker's assistant asked Neena Gupta when she had returned to Mumbai. Neena Gupta added that she told her that she had never left Mumbai in the first place. Most people in Mumbai thought the actress had moved to Delhi after marrying Vivek Mehra in 2008. "I remember feeling so angry and upset after that meeting. Is this what people think? That I am married and now live in Delhi? Is this why I am net getting any work? I was seething by the time I reached home and did something that was extremely impulsive without running it past anybody," she wrote.
After the incident, the National Award-winning actress decided to share a post on Instagram (with her 11,000 followers then) to clarify that she was based in Mumbai and was more than willing to work. She posted about herself, writing: "I live in Mumbai and working as a good actor looking for good parts to play." Neena Gupta, who had a tough time exploring social media, added, "Please excuse the grammar and spellings. I know I made some errors there. I wrote it out of passion and fury. Do bear in mind that I am from the older generation, so texting and social media are things I still work very hard at. But this is what I posted along with a picture of myself that I thought did justice to how well I had aged over the years."
The post went viral and a got a whole lot of love from fans and members of the film industry. The actress, who was then slightly nervous about the post, did not know what it would manifest into. "The post went viral. Two minutes after posting it, I knew it was too late to delete it. I received a barrage of comments and many of them seemed good. But I suddenly felt choked with guilt and shame because I didn't really know what I had just done," she wrote in her book sharing her thoughts at that time. "I was scared that the media would pick it up, and the next day, the headlines would state that this actor was in such dire straits that she took to Instagram, a medium she barely knew, and begged for work."
After the post, Neena Gupta bagged the lead role in Badhaai Ho and even won a Filmfare Award for it. She also featured in Panchaayat, Sandeep Aur Pinky Faraar, Panga, Sardar Ka Grandson and even starred in Masaba Masaba, alongside her daughter.